Yves,
I had a situation which seems to be similar to what you are observing. Also a
new paper, custom self-made ICC profile, and a strong sepia tone when printed.
There were in total three scenarios I encountered a similar issue in.
1. As a result of a printer firmware update, new paper media settings were
installed and some of the pre-existing media settings stopped working. The
manifestation was an unexpected sepia tone on prints. Notably, the affected
paper was of the printer manufacturer, and its settings were completely stock,
no custom ICC profile. It was necessary to recreate the paper settings based on
the new media settings to make this paper print correctly again.
2. I was using an incorrect selection of media with one of the third-party
papers I use. The manifestation was a slight sepia/reddish tone and quite
pronounced bronzing. After I switched to a different media settings (although
also switched the ICC profile) the situation was resolved.
3. The originally mentioned scenario where the paper was completely new, not
well known, no manufacturer ICC profile, so I created my own. This is the
scenario where the sepia tone was very pronounced. I put a decent effort into
the investigation but was not able to decisively resolve this. One of the
reasons for it is I wasn't that interested in this particular paper, and the
other was that some of the aspects I was discovering in the process were quite
beyond my level of understanding. Below are some of my findings.
The ICC profile (made by me using Argyll) was one of the things I looked into.
What I found is that the ICC profile, when applied manually to the image the
same way as it would be at print time, had a correct result, no sepia tone.
When applied in soft-proofing mode, that is, in the opposite direction, it did
result in the same sepia tone as on print. Note that in this setup the printer
is out of the equation, it's just calculations on the image itself. Therefore
one potential culprit would be that the ICC profile was not applied correctly
by the pipeline (or created by Argyll), which is not likely. As there was no
vendor ICC-profile for this paper, I could not compare directly, but a vendor
profile of another paper did not produce such tint in either direction.
Another possibility is that I printed the calibration targets (840 patches)
with color correction applied. I did try to avoid that and used Adobe Color
Printer Utility, but if I made a mistake, it might explain the resulting
profile having a deviation from the neutral. I did not try to re-print the
targets, as like I said, making this paper work was not critical.
Here are some things to try beyond what was already suggested.
Verify the ICC profile itself is neutral enough and is not the source of the
unwanted sepia tint. This is done by applying the profile to a tiff image in
direct and soft-proofing mode, as described in
https://torger.se/anders/photography/argyll-print.html#soft_proofing ;
<https://torger.se/anders/photography/argyll-print.html#soft_proofing>. If
there is a similar sepia tint on one of the resulting images, the ICC profile
is probably faulty.
Change the printer media settings to another type of paper, see whether it
affects the tone on print. If it does, the ICC profile might be fine but the
media settings might need tuning.
Since you are using non-original inks, their viscosity may be different which
may affect the dot gain. If the inks are more liquid, the dot gain would be
greater and the print would come out darker. Should be fixable by regulating
the amount of ink in the media settings or printing with one of the Photoshop
stock Dot Gain profiles (only for diagnostics of course).
Cheers.
On Mar 18, 2022, at 23:38, Yves Gauvreau <gauvreauyves@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
Unfortunately, I can't do that because I don't use the original inks, after
verification the gamut are different especially for mate papers, which
present a significant loss of DMax.
Thanks for the Rodney link, I'm going to have a little bit of fun with all
the info in there.
I think I got it though, my setup works fine for other paper and profiles I
have, I have a quasi perfect match most of the time. With this specific
paper, well it's more difficult.
"Most of them are pretty decent in my experience" I have had the same
experience except with Red River profiles, they are way off. a B&W inmage
prints sepia with there profile, which is nice if that's what you want but
with a custom profile B&W are B&W.
As for printing from Lightroom, I would think that Adobe is using the exact
same engine as in Photoshop (CMM).
Yves
On 3/18/2022 4:28 PM, Alan Goldhammer (agoldhammer) wrote:
If you are concerned about your profile, use the profile that the paper
manufacturer has made for your printer. Most of them are pretty decent in
my experience and you could then see if your profile is the problem. As I
noted you do need to find a good standard test print. You can print it
letting the printer manage colors and see if you still get a dark print. I
don’t print from Photoshop only Lightroom and don’t know if there are
somethings that need to be done in Photoshop but it is possible to double
profile which can cause problems. Just double check all the settings in
your work flow along with making sure the printer driver is current. Only
other possibility is that there is something wrong with your printer.
Alan
From: argyllcms-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx <mailto:argyllcms-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
<argyllcms-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> <mailto:argyllcms-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> On
Behalf Of Yves Gauvreau
Sent: Friday, March 18, 2022 4:09 PM
To: argyllcms@xxxxxxxxxxxxx <mailto:argyllcms@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Subject: [argyllcms] Re: Prints to dark, how to fix this?
On 3/18/2022 12:01 PM, Alan Goldhammer (agoldhammer) wrote:
This video from Andrew Rodney is useful:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iS6sjZmxjY4 ;
<https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iS6sjZmxjY4>
What happens if you print a standardized image from your printer?
I forgot to try this.
Are the colors and brightness level correct?
I use Photoshop to soft proof the image before printing and I make a copy
without soft proofing active and I try to match them as best as I can.
Whatever I do here, the print is much darker, it's unacceptable to me when I
have to tweak my image before printing, that's guess work.
What is the light source you are viewing the "too dark images" under?
Perhaps your viewing light source is not bright enough. Remember, prints
are reflective; the monitor is transmissive. Personally, I think your
screen brightness is very low. Are you using it in a dark room?
I use a high CRI > 95 5000K 800 Lumens Led bulb to view my prints and about
2 feet above the print. My screen is a BenQ SW270C that I hardware
calibrated with my I1 Pro 2 and on top of that I made another profile with
DisplayCal and I get pretty good results, nothing above 1.0 DE2000 and I
view my screen in about 30 lux of light measured at 2 feet from my screen.
I'm practically certain it's the profile but I don't know how to test this
hypothesis and if I'm right, I don't know either how to correct it so I
don't have to tweak my image all the time, I'm not convinced at all that
this is the way to go.
Yves
